Monday, February 02, 2015

Cake Shots

I have this cookbook called Booze Cakes. My coworker Janet also has a copy (she's the one who told me about it) and she makes cakes from it for birthdays and parties in our office. There's an amazing recipe for a Golden Rum Cake. She made me a delicious Harvey Wallbanger cake for my 30th birthday. There's a pink champagne cake I want to try, and I might try the Long Island Iced Tea Cakes for my gentleman's birthday. You should definitely buy this cookbook, and tell me what you make from it. It's great.

One of the more complicated recipes in here is for Cake Shots. There are two different styles of serving. There's a fancy version, where they made a sheet cake, made a separate pan of jello shots, and then cut them into little circles and layered them all fancy in shot glasses with garnishes and stuff. Beautiful, but time consuming. AND I AM REALLY LAZY LATELY. And I was already making a lot of food for our Super Bowl party.

So I went with the poke-cake variation. I baked the cake, then I mixed up the Jello and let it set up in a bowl for a little bit. When it was just becoming solid, I spread it over the top of the cake. There are a ton of flavor variations in the cookbook, but I went with the Cosmopolitan flavor. It involved raspberry Jello, cranberry juice, vodka, lime, and Triple Sec. I omitted the lime, and I used strawberry Jello because I'd accidentally purchased that. Even though some Triple Sec was baked into the cake, I also sprinkled some on top of the warm cake to soak through. This was good because I think the cake would have been a little bit dry without it.

The mistake I made was serving it directly from the cake pan. It didn't look very appealing, and I think people feel weird serving themselves from a cake pan. My gentleman and I have no qualms about it and ate A LOT OF CAKE. You might have noticed the theme of edible alcohol from our party. I was feeling experimental. Anyway, the cake was very good. I do think the different variations would be fun, and I certainly would consider making it for a Fancy Party if I had Fancy Shot Glasses to serve them in. But otherwise, I was disappointed with the general reception to the cake and wouldn't waste the effort again.

I'm going to type up the recipe with the generic ingredients, and with the poke-cake instructions. Sub in your own liquor, juice, and Jello preferences. You can add candy, fruit, chocolate, whipped cream, whatever. This is a very flexible base recipe.

{I'm sorry for the quality; those random holes in the middle of the cake are my doing.}

In a mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar 3-5 minutes, or until light and fluffy. Beat in egg yolks and milk; stir in vanilla and liquor. Mix in flour, baking powder, and salt.

In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until stiff. Gently fold egg whites into the batter. Fill the pan 2/3 full and bake 25-30 minutes. Mine took about 35 minutes to fully bake through in the middle.

In a saucepan, bring 2/3 cups water or juice to a boil; stir in gelatin until dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool about 20 minutes. Stir in alcohol. Refrigerate until gelatin just begins to set. Drop in fruit or other mix-ins, if desired.

Spread gelatin evenly over cooled cake and refrigerate for at least 3 hours.